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Full Description

The last major conference on infrared astronomy was the IAU Symposium No. 96 in June 1980. Since then, the discipline has continued to mature and to contribute to all branches of astrophysics. One particular area of growth has been in spectroscopic capabilities at all infrared wavelengths. The purpose of the Symposium in Toledo was to review the scientific questions to be addressed via infrared spectroscopy and to provide, in the proceedings, a useful summary of the field. The sensitivity of infrared spectroscopic observations is still generally limited by detector characteristics or by thermal background radiation. However in recent years improvements in detector technology together with developments in spectroscopic instrumentation have made possible both quite detailed spectroscopy of the brighter members of many classes of galactic sources and also begun to open up some infrared spectroscopy of extragalactic sources. The potential of the field in the next decade or two is clear. The lRAS mission has completed one of the pre-requisites, namely an all-sky photometric survey. Major space missions utilising cryogenic infrared telescopes have been approved in Europe (ISO) and seem likely in the USA (SIRTF); plans for space submillimeter telescopes are firming up. On the ground large telescopes optimized for infrared observations are now in operation at high altitude sites and specialized submillimeter facilities are under construction. The particular advantages of planned, very large telescopes for infrared observations are widely accepted.

Contents

Welcome Address.- Welcome Address.- Section I: Interstellar Dust and Chemistry.- Absorption and Emission Characteristics of Interstellar Dust.- Observed Spectral Features of Dust.- Formation of Molecules on Dust.- Gas Phase Chemistry in the Interstellar Medium.- Observational Constraints on Interstellar Chemistry.- Section II: Emission Processes and their Interpretation.- Atomic and Ionic Emission Processes.- Infrared Spectroscopy of Interstellar Shocks.- Infrared Hydrogen Emission Lines from HII Regions and "Protostars".- The Significance of Far-Infrared Spectra of the Interstellar Medium.- Astrophysical Interpretation of Molecular Spectra.- Excitation Conditions in Molecular Clouds.- Section III: Galactic Sources.- Far-Infrared Spectroscopy of Neutral Interstellar Clouds.- Molecular Astronomy at Submillimeter Wavelengths.- Submillimeter Observations of Molecules and the Structure of Giant Molecular Clouds.- Energetic Outflows, Winds and Jets Around Young Stars.- Near-Infrared Spectroscopy of H2 and CO in Molecular Clouds.- Spectroscopy of HII Regions in the 1 - 15 ?m Region.- Far-Infrared Spectroscopy of HII Regions.- Infrared Spectroscopy of Late Type Stars.- Infrared Spectroscopy of Evolved Objects.- Section IV: Galactic Centre and Extragalactic Systems.- The Galactic Center.- Ground-Based Extragalactic Infrared Spectroscopy and Related Studies.- A Comparison of the FIR Line and Continuum Emission from External Galaxies with the Emission from our Galaxy.- Molecular Gas Distribution in Spiral Galaxies.- Titles of Contributed Papers.- Object Index.